Glass panel detection with FlexChain
Related Products
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Application
Description
In Electronic & Solar industry glass panels are used as a protection layer for Monitors, Screens, Displays like Smart-TVs. The panels are very thin but can have a width of more than 1m. During production they are stored on a shelf. In each shelf compartment one panel is stored. In total several dozen panels are stored on one shelf.
Challenge
The panels are very thin (below 1mm) with a big width. They have a reflective but transparent surface. Many panels are stored in one shelf. This creates following challenges:- Very transparent objects to detect
- Reflections leads to cross talk because of low spacing below 50mm between the shelf compartments
- Being only 1mm thick makes a correct detection from the side difficult
- Many single positions for detection needed. Installation and wiring needs to be kept to an affordable level.
- Every customer has individual panel spacing.
Application Solution
Because of the challenges many standard technologies have some disadvantages. Here an overview:
Photoelectric sensors: cabling effort is too high for so many sensors. Whether the sensor alignment is very sensitive or cross talk is very likely.
Standard automation lightgrids: Advantage of an automation lightgrid is that they are easy to install and cross talk cannot occur thanks to the sequential beam-to-beam triggering. But the individual compartment spacing of each customer would lead to a customized beam spacing for every customer. This would be difficult to realize in a timely and cost-effective manner.
Our solution
FlexChain: FlexChain offers the combination of two worlds:
It offers the sequential beam-to-beam triggering like an automation lightgrid and with that the risk of cross task is eliminated. For a reliable detection the connected through-beam sensors are misaligned. This leads to a reflection on the panel surfaces and with that a sufficient signal drop. Furthermore, it offers the same flexible beam spacing as installing single photoelectric sensors without leading to too much cabling effort thanks to the cascaded connection principle. Please see below a sketch with an installation example including the functional principle.
Summary advantages FlexChain
- Reliable glass panel detection. No cross talk possible, thanks to lightgrid technology (sequential triggering of every beam)
- Individual beam spacing compared to lightgrids
- Easy sensor alignment thanks to big open angle
- Easy wiring concept thanks to bus topology
- Status of every beam
- Detailed diagnostic information of every sensor
Further information
Electronic & Solar; IO-Link; Transparent Object Detection; Semiconductor; RS-485; IO-Link; CANopen